The New York Red Bulls are on the verge of signing veteran French forward Péguy Luyindula, who played most recently for Paris Saint-Germain and has been on trial with the MLS club.

“He’s done exactly what were hoping he would do. And the price is phenomenal, so as far as that’s concerned, I know nothings been signed yet but we’re very close, leaning toward the signing,” Red Bulls coach Mike Petke told reporters on Wednesday, according to the New York Post. “Not only his fitness, but his playing has risen every day to the point he’s been great to have in practice. It’s a very good option to sign him if everything works out perfect.”

Luyindula, 33, reached a contract termination agreement with PSG in December and has played sparingly since falling out of favor during the 2011-12 season. He’s been practicing with the Red Bulls since early February.

“One thing we’d heard rumor about is he’d been removed from the team at PSG,” Petke explained. “We wanted to know why and we talked to the owner of the team and it was stated the coach who was fired three weeks after he was removed (in December ’11) was not a good situation with the coach, and he removed him unwarranted and he was brought right back to the team once the coach was removed. That answered a lot of questions for us. His attitude’s been great. People like Thierry and other people we trust have talked highly of him, Juninho, and his attitude’s been great here.’’

Luyindula reportedly is friends with fellow Frenchman and New York captain Thierry Henry. He also was a teammate of new Red Bulls midfielder Juninho Pernambucano at Olympique Lyonnais.

Luyindula has played six times for the French national team and featured in his country’s qualifying campaign for the 2010 World Cup. He won three Ligue 1 championships at Lyon and helped PSG claim the Coupe de France in ’10.

New York doesn’t have much depth at forward behind Henry and Fabián Espíndola, who was acquired from Real Salt Lake during the offseason. However, defense has been the issue so far for the 0-1-1 Red Bulls, who have yielded five goals in two games. New York hosts D.C. United on Saturday (12:30 p.m. ET, NBC).